Direct Wines

Direct Wines Ltd is an international, independent wine merchant with global turnover in excess of £350m.

The Challenge

Black Friday has previously been a profitable time for Direct Wines. They wanted to capitalise on this period of increased consumer spending, whilst standing out from the crowded market.

Direct Wines were looking to promote their Black Friday offering in a relevant and engaging way. They partnered with Adestra to help drive revenue and give customers a great experience across multiple channels.

However, they did not want to cannibalise their December sales, instead looking to sustain sales throughout the Christmas period. This strategy would be executed across the two core brands: Laithwaites and The Sunday Times Wine Club.

The Strategy

Direct Wines’ Black Friday email campaigns have historically performed quite well. Regardless, the team believed they could do even better by coordinating their efforts across channels and serving personalised content to different customer segments. They started planning their efforts in April and got together a cross-functional team.

The Direct Wines teams identified three key areas of focus to drive the success of their Black Friday strategy:

‘Leveraging Black Friday Week’

To build excitement, and stand out in the inbox, Direct Wines sent out an email every day in the week leading up to Black Friday.

Cross-Channel Co-Ordination

The same offers and content were executed across digital and print. The Customer Service team also offered the same deals over the phone to maintain consistency.

Personalised Content

Depending on previously stated customer preferences, email content was tailored to reflect the audience’s favourite type of wine e.g. an all red case.

The Result

The Black Friday campaign was a huge success for Direct Wines. Engagement was excellent, with most email campaigns achieving much higher than usual open and click-through rates. Most impressively, across all channels Direct Wines saw revenue grow to three times that of the previous year.